Model Engineer & Workshop August 2025 issue **20 PAGE FREE PREVIEW**

EDITORIAL

Editor: Neil Wyatt Deputy Editor: Diane Carney Designer: Darren Hendley Illustrator: Grahame Chambers Publisher: Tim Hartley By post: Model Engineer & Workshop, Kelsey Media Ltd, Media Centre, Morton Way, Horncastle, Lincs LN9 6JR. Telephone: 01507 529589 Email: meweditor@mortons.co.uk ©2025 Kelsey Media Ltd. ISSN: 0033-8923

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Short Series Sought Following the recent reader survey I have been looking at the articles lined up for the magazine. There is one type of article that would seem to fit reader’s interests very well, that I have relatively few of. That is shorter constructional series, in perhaps one to half a dozen parts, featuring a

relatively straightforward tool or model.

Mike Chrisp’s pipe bending kit, photographed at Harrogate ten years ago would be an example of something that could be covered this way. If anyone would like the guidelines for contributors, please do get in touch.

PUBLISHING

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EDITORIAL CONTRIBUTIONS

Accepted photographs and articles will be paid for upon publication. Items we cannot use will be returned if accompanied by a stamped addressed envelope, and recorded delivery must clearly state so and enclose sufficient postage.

In common with practice in other periodicals, all material is sent or returned at the contributor’s own risk, and neither Model Engineer & Workshop Magazine, the editor, the staff, nor Kelsey Media Ltd can be held responsible for loss or damage, howsoever caused.

The opinions expressed in ME&W are not necessarily those of the editor or staff.

This periodical must not, without the written consent of the publishers, be given, lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise disposed of in a mutilated condition or in any unauthorized cover, by way of trade, or annexed to or as part of any publication or advertising, literary or pictorial matter whatsoever.

The Bradford Cup and Stevenson Trophy 2025 I would like to remind readers of these two competitions. Full details and competition rules were published in issue 4766; I have only received a few nominations so, if you can help ensure it’s a real competition, please get your entries and nominations to me as soon as possible.

The Bradford Cup is awarded to the

This issue was published on:

16 July 2025

The next issue will be on sale:

15 August 2025

KELSEYmedia

Neil Wyatt Editor

author of the best article or series in Model Engineer/Model Engineer & Workshop during the previous year. To make a nomination, please send the name of the author and the article in question to meweditor@ mortons.co.uk by 25 July 2025.

The John Stevenson Trophy is presented for a well-made and usable piece of tooling, a modification to a machine or an accessory for a tool where the fact it works well is more important than making it look good. To enter, send four good photographs of your entry with up to 500 words of description by email to meweditor@mortons.co.uk no later than 25 July 2025.

Diane Carney Deputy Editor

August 2025 | 3

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Contents 9 Making the Stuart Models Planer Chris Gunn introduces Stuart Models’ range of workshop machinery models, with a focus on the planer.

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17 The BR Standard 2-6-0 Class 4 Standard Engine Doug Hewson details the machining of the cylinders.

22 Another collection of hints and tips for the workshop In Brian Wood’s final article for ME&W he shares a mixture of ideas he found online and some from his own experience.

26 Headstock Modifications Brett Meacle wanted positive, repeatable alignment of his lathe headstock, and reversed the spindle for modification.

34 A GWR Pannier Tank in 3 ½ Inch Gauge Gerald Martyn shares his boiler design for this compact live steam loco.

42 A Response to the Yield Point Method Mark de Barr reacts to this method for calculating boiler shell thickness.

44 Backyard Foundry Techniques – Riser and Ingate Design Luker explains how to determine the size of risers for successful home casting, including a downloadable calculator.

48 Quick Notes from the Workshop A more detailed explanation of the use of a rotary tailstock chuck.

50 Workshop Diary Alex du Pre experiments with the suitability of superglues for holding work on the milling machine.

53 Cover Feature – An Introduction to IMLEC The Editor explains the background to the International Model Locomotive Efficiency Competition.

56 Book Review We review Geoff Lewis’ Building Iron, about his time as an apprentice with Ruston Bucyrus.

Subscribe today!

Get your favourite magazine for less – delivered to your door!

See pages 34-35 for details!

6 | www.model-engineer.co.uk

58 A Tandem Compound Mill Engine David Thomas continues with his build of Arnold Throp’s Corliss engine design.

66 Beginner’s Workshop Geometer details a range of spark plug spanners, as would have been needed in the 1950s.

67 Cheap Nasty Plastics Patrick Hendra moves on to the place thermoset plastics and ceramics have in the workshop.

74 Cutting A Circular Slot – In an Unusual Way Johannes Schiff approximates using an angled end mill and explains his downloadable calculator.

74 MODEL ENGINEER & WORKSHOP

VOLUME 234 ISSUE 4767 August 2025

Regulars 3 Smoke Rings Thoughts from the Editor’s Bench.

14 Postbag This month’s Postbag was bulging at the seams. Send the editors your letters at meweditor@ mortons.co.uk.

Visit our Website www.model-engineer.co.uk

Why not follow us on X? www.x.com/ModelEngineers hashtag #MEW There’s lots of extra content to be found online to support past articles in Model Engineer & Workshop.

Find out more at: www.model-engineer.co.uk/forums Download Luker’s Riser Design Methodology Calculator using this quick link or QR code: tinyurl.com/433h4v9n ➔

16 Readers’ Tips Our tips winner has a holder for a holder to improve parting off. Send your tips to meweditor@mortons. co.uk, and you could win a prize.

➔

Download Johannes Schiff’s curved slot calculator using this quick link or QR code: tinyurl.com/4x662us9

63 On the Wire This month, more news about model engineering events.

72 Club Diary Your guide to events at clubs around the UK. 77 Club News Geoff Theasby’s monthly report with news of engineering clubs across the country.

80 Readers’ Classifieds It’s time to bag a workshop bargain, or if you have something to sell, email us the details or use the form in this issue.

Hot topics on the forum include: Boiler Design tarted by Charles Lamont. Online discussion of the Yield Point Method.

All things Beaver Mill started by Robert James 3. Several years of accumulated wisdom for owners of these versatile machines.

Firth Valve Gear started by Andy Stopford. An unusual valve gear arrangement used on Fowler traction engines.

Come and have a Chat!

As well as plenty of engineering and hobby related discussion, we are happy for forum members to use it to share advice and support. Come and join us – it’s free to all readers!

On the Cover

Next Issue

Our cover features Andrew Pope’s King Arthur Class locomotive Sir Mador de la Porte going up the 1:70 incline at Titchfield, during his run at the 56th International Model Locomotive Efficiency Competition. To find out more about the competition, see page 52.

In our next issue, Gerard Dean describes the challenge of bringing a rather large model around the globe.

August 2025 | 7

STUART Models

Making the Stuart Models Planer

Chris Gunn builds an unusual model from castings and this month he starts by introducing the Stuart Models machine tool range.

Photo 1: The Stuart Models Planer.

I

have always been interested in miniature machine tools, maybe the very best were those built by Barry Jordan exhibited some years ago. I noticed recently that the Bridgeport miller and lathe he built was up for auction, but these will have been sold long before this article gets into print.

When Stuart Models introduced their range of machine tool casting sets I bought them as they came out and have completed them all. I also had an example of the steam hammer from way back which is an old favourite since the castings business was part of Stuart Turner. Photograph 2 shows the wood turning lathe, and photo 3 the metal turning lathe, which looks a bit bare without a workpiece in place.

Photograph 4 shows the shaper, also without a vice or workpiece.

Photograph 5 is the drill, this time I did make a small drilling jig to cross drill some pins, and clamps to hold it to the table.

Having built the machine tools I then became interested in putting together a miniature machine

shop, having seen examples of these at various exhibitions and museums.

One of my favourite miniature machine shops was seen at the Edison Ford museum in Fort Myers, Florida. Henry Ford built a winter home in Fort Myers, and was joined by his friend Edison. They set up some workshops and laboratories there and amongst other things used these to look for alternatives to natural rubber.

More information can be had at www. edisonfordwinterestates.org.

One is able to visit the workshop and laboratory, which has a mixture of scientific equipment and machine tools driven by line shafts. In the museum section can be found many Edison related items, including

phonographs, and docents lecture and demonstrate the phonographs which I found very interesting.

There is also a model of the lab workshop. Photograph 6 shows the real workshop, with the lathe front and centre, and a part of the shaper in the bottom right corner. Photograph 7 shows the model with the lathe in the centre foreground and the shaper to its right.

By the time I saw this in November 2017, I already had this project developing in my head so I took pictures of the line shafting as well, as I intended to install this in my diorama. Photograph 8 shows some of the line shafting in the real workshop.

I also saw some pictures of a diorama with some machine tools from PMR kits, with the line shafting driving them all, powered by a Stuart Models Victoria engine. I decided to get a Victoria kit from Stuarts and soon had that underway, photo 9. I also had a look at the PMR website and they list various machine tools and also line shafting kits; photo 10 shows the un-machined PMR kit, with the two sizes of white metal pulleys August 2025 | 9

Photo 2: The Wood Turning Lathe.

Photo 3: The Metal Lathe.

Photo 4: The Shaper.

Photo 5: The Pillar Drill.

available.

They also stock some items to fit out a works office, and doors and windows to suit, which I believe are items used in dolls’ houses. This is handy, as the items are to the same scale which means one can add any items that can be found in the dolls’ house catalogues, so one could add a kettle, tea pot and mugs, as no engineering office is complete without these essentials!

I decided to order some kits from their range and arranged for them to be shipped to a hotel we were staying at in Fort Myers, Florida, after checking the weights to ensure I could bring them back. This all worked perfectly, thanks to all involved, and I have started on some of these kits. Being mainly white metal-based castings, one needs to adopt different means of holding some of the more delicate items, so I am having to make jigs to hold parts for machining.

To add to the mix I was lucky enough to pick up a part-machined set of castings for the Stuart under-type engine online and, fortunately, these had been started by a good engineer and were beautifully machined. I finished off machining the castings and 10 | www.model-engineer.co.uk

assembled the engine which ran very well on air. I decided to make a boiler for it, which was a nice change and kept the workshop warm for a few days in winter. Then I got carried away and made a plinth and a friend turned up some handrail stanchions for me

on his CNC lathe, so I took it apart again and painted it. This too looked good enough to build a miniature machine shop around, in due course.

Photograph 11 shows the under-type ready for work!

I now had the Stuart machine tools all done from way back, plus the Victoria and/or the under-type to drive it all, and the PMR line shafting kits ready to machine, together with some additional items for the diorama.

About this time I also saw the sample miniature planer on the Stuart Models stand at one of the UK exhibitions and this seemed ideal to include in my miniature workshop.

When I made enquires, I was told that, at that time, they had no plans to market it. However I didn’t give up and at the London exhibition in January 2019 Stuarts agreed to sell me a set of castings and the hand drawn drawings.

In due course the castings were ready and I took delivery of them, and drawings, in March 2019.

I was not ready to start on the planer as I was finishing a 6” scale Ruston Proctor for a friend, but I did come across some of the history of the development of the planer in the book by L.T.C. Rolt entitled Tools for the Job. My version is the reprint by the Science Museum, an ex-library copy bought from Amazon. This is a good read if you are interested in the history of machine tools in the UK. At the time of writing there were copies still available.

I read that once the lathe had been refined and accurate round work could be undertaken - and Maudslay had produced his leadscrew lathe to enable accurate screw cutting,

Photo 6: Original workshop at the Edison Ford Winter Museum.

MODEL ENGINEER & WORKSHOP

STUART Models

Photo 7: The museum’s model workshop.

Photo 8: Line shafting at the museum.

measuring and dividing - then attention turned to producing accurate flat surfaces so the planer gradually evolved. The planer and lathes were then able to reproduce themselves.

I have mentioned before that I served my apprenticeship at Timsons in Kettering. At that time they were very big in the manufacture of printing presses, building bespoke machines for anything from postage stamps to postal orders and books and also a range of standard small machines called the Wun-Up. They also had a big planer which was impressive.

I wanted to illustrate the type of work the planer at Timsons used to do in this article, so when I was looking

for a picture of a typical printing machine, I started with a copy of the 100 Year Anniversary souvenir book that employees were given in 1996. I looked at the front cover, and found a picture of the factory way back, with all the machines driven from line shafting and, to my surprise, there in the middle left is a planer, of similar design to the Stuart model and next to it is a large radial drill that was used to drill the frames, photo 12.

I did manage to find a couple of pictures of the Wun-Up machines in the book; the original one, photo 13, the first Wun-Up, and the Wun-Up Litho S, photo 14. (Photographs 12 to 14 are used with the permission of Timsons Engineering Ltd.)

I worked on the Wun-up Litho S prototype when I was in the drawing office there, back in the mid 1960s. I also have a closer picture of part of the Wun-up litho side frame, which I must have obtained at the time, showing the part I was working on, photo 15. It can be seen that the base of this machine is a steel fabrication rather than a cast bed in the earlier versions.

All the printing machines Timsons made were built with cast iron side frames, up to 3” thick and up to 12 feet long and 3 or 4 feet wide. The frames were cast in their own foundry and were all machined on the large planer with a bed about 5 feet wide by 20 feet long. As a raw apprentice in 1960 I was fascinated with this machine which was the biggest in the machine shop and a sight to see in action. This was a key machine in the process and manned by a rather serious operator, Ken Pierce. At the end of the day, he was machining expensive castings so needed to be dedicated to his job. I discussed this machine with a couple of my fellow apprentices at a reunion recently, and learned that the planer had a DC drive, rather than the belt drive of the Stuart model. In the winter of discontent the company bought a generator to power the machine shop and someone had to come in early to start the generator then start the planer up early too before the rest of the shop turned up and turned on.

Apart from the drive, the later Timson’s machine was similar to the model. The table used to whoosh back and forth, the DC drive returning the table quicker than the cutting stroke, and the tool would take a serious cut off the face of the castings. If space allowed, two castings would be machined at the same time. On occasions the planer would machine the steel bed fabrications mentioned above, and then passers-by would need a steel helmet as the chips came off like bullets, blue and smoking.

Incidentally, the layout in the 1960s was just the same as in the old picture above, photo 12.

In that picture, next to the planer was a large radial drill, used to drill the frames in pairs. When I was there, much later on of course, the layout was the same; quite logical I suppose, as the frames would pass from the planer to the big drill. This was probably the second largest machine in the shop, manned by Bert Mills, one of the smallest men in there. Bert Mills was the brother of one of the Cockleshell heroes of WW2, Marine William Mills who was a Kettering man. William Mills August 2025 | 11

Photo 9: Horizontal steam engine, Victoria.

Photo 10: PMR line shaft kit.

was one of the few who completed his mission and placed his mines on the ships, then fled on foot with his shipmate. Both were caught and shot as spies by the Nazis. As I edit this, we have just passed the 80th Anniversary of VE day; a number of my older workmates at the time went through WW2 and yet made little of it.

Drilling the printer side frames was an exacting job, as the various holes for the gears and shafts had to be very accurately spaced to ensure smooth running of all the gears. A large jig was

used for the standard machines but any bespoke machines had to be set out carefully.

A few years before I left the company, they bought a large jig borer from Germany, which was installed in its own climate-controlled enclosure to maintain accuracy and maybe to cosset whatever control system was employed at the time, as we are talking early sixties - so no CNC as we know it today. When the jig borer was installed, the holes were drilled from coordinates calculated in the drawing office, rather than using a jig on the radial drill. One of my jobs in the drawing office was then to check the hole coordinates from the frame datum. The coordinates were calculated by a lady using a mechanical calculator. I was given her results and expected to check them using another mechanical calculator and square root tables to solve the various triangles. During my stay in the drawing office, an electronic calculator was purchased to speed up the process and was used for the initial calculations. As far as I recall this cost £3,000 in 1965 or so, equivalent to over £50,000 today. I dread to think what the jig borer cost. The calculator was 24” wide by 12” back to front and about 6” tall and fitted with Nixie display modules about an inch

Photo 11: Under-type engine on its plinth.

12 | www.model-engineer.co.uk

MODEL ENGINEER & WORKSHOP

STUART Models

Photo 14: The Wun-up Litho S. Photo 13: The first model of the Wun-Up printing press.

Photo 12: Planer is visible at the left in the Timson Engineering workshop. high. I did have a look on the internet and found some information about early calculators and realised this could have been an Anita calculator,

made in the UK. This had been available in the right time frame. Despite the high cost, the calculator could not do square roots. It did, however, save time on other calculations. Our leader would only spring for one of these calculators so I was left still turning handles on the mechanical calculator.

We must have done a good job though, as we never had any complaints.

In order to obtain permission to use the Timson’s pictures in my article, I did pay a visit to the current machine shop to see if the planer was still there and found it was not. I did learn from one of the old hands working there that it was replaced by a Futurmill Plano miller, photo 16. That too was long gone.

I have probably rambled on enough about my reasons for tackling the Stuart planer project so I will move onto its construction in future issues.

To be continued

Photo 15: A side frame of the Wun-Up Litho S.

Photo 16: Timson’s Futurmill Plano Miller.

August 2025 | 13

PostBag is one of the most popular sections of the magazine - readers want to hear from you! Drop us a line sharing your advice, questions or opinions. Why not send us a picture of your latest workshop creation, or that strange tool you found in a boot sale? Email your contributions to meweditor@mortons.co.uk.

POLYMERS IN THE WORKSHOP 1

these would have been fabricated from glass, metal, rubber etc. and the wide use of injection moulding to produce plastic alternatives certainly reduced prices making infection control, through the use of single use devices, possible.

The use of plastics in additive fabrication using computer-controlled printers has revolutionised our understanding of what engineering is about. The possibility of using plastics in aggressive and high temperature environments as alternatives to metals is possible, however, material science tells us that it is unlikely that apart from toys, plastics will ever dominate in the hobbyist's workshop, until suitable means of joining parts, apart from screws and rivets, is developed.

As a chemist who enjoys model engineering, I look forward to how the two disciplines can work synergistically to bring different exciting plastics into our hobby.

Ron Barson, Chairman Bournemouth & District Society of Model Engineers

POLYMERS IN THE WORKSHOP 2

is also well worth reading. Both books are still in print and available from the usual sources.

But one comment I must take issue with. 'Carbon fibre sheet is incredibly strong and it doesn't dent!' Well, perhaps, but what it can do after an impact is crack between composite layers below the surface with no sign of surface damage. Subsequent stress cycles can grow such cracking until the composite is severely delaminated, and the strength and rigidity compromised. This is especially the case with thermoset resins which are not as tough as genuine engineering thermoplastic. That such failure of the structure can be sudden and catastrophic should need no emphasis on my part, given the dreadful loss of the CF composite hulled Titan at depth in the Atlantic in June 2023.

Dr Mike Gray, Louth, Lincs

Dear Neil, I was pleased to read the first part of the article entitled 'Cheap Nasty Plastics' by Patrick Hendra. As a child of many polymers in the 50’s one of my first forays into engineering in miniature, apart from Meccano, was plastic kits made by the Airfix company. Being able to solvent weld the polystyrene bits together without sticking yourself to the plastic with the high VOC plastic cement was always a bit of luck over judgement, especially when under the influence of the sniffed solvent!

Plastics have certainly come a very long way from the thermoset 'Bakelite' urea-formaldehyde and formaldehyde-resorcinol polymers to the modern thermoplastics used so widely for a plethora of applications across all areas of manufacturing.

Sadly, most plastics are not capable of being joined chemically, limiting the engineer to mechanical fixings, usually metal as Patrick states.

We used solvent welding as well as radio frequency welding and ultrasonic welding in assembling medical single use components. Formerly,

I read with great interest Patrick Hendra's very worthwhile article (ME&W 4766) on plastics. Having worked in the plastics industry in the UK and in the USA for about 30 years, on materials ranging from polypropylene to PET film via continuous carbon fibre composites in Aerospace (both thermoset and thermoplastic resins, PEEK for example) I can more than empathise with many of the points around properties he raises. It's always wise to buy from a reputable supplier who provides a proper Data Sheet, metal or plastic.

His comment about the muddle between strength and rigidity echoes J E Gordon's similar observation in 'The New Science of Strong Materials' that in our Western mind we tend to judge that if a structure is rigid, it is also strong - not necessarily so. 'Structures - or Why Things Don't Fall Down' 14 | www.model-engineer.co.uk

YIELD POINT METHOD

Good Morning Neil, Thank you for publishing our YPM article, there has been a lively interest shown on the MEW forum and we have been active in responding to comments.

One of the comments relates to a mistake in a calculation in our published article and we have responded with a correction on the forum (see marked up excerpt).

Please note that this in no way detracts from the philosophy nor the conclusions of the article. We do apologise for the error and will take steps to upgrade our checking procedure should there be any future articles.

Alan Brown, Les Smith, by email

MODEL ENGINEER & WORKSHOP

READERS' Letters WHEEL PROFILES

Dear Neil, I note that Mr. MJP of Louth asks about wheel profiles on P41 of ME+E No 4763. Yes there are a profusion of wheel standards which have been published over the years but for a 5” gauge loco I would stick to the Martin Evans one or the GL5 one. There is very little difference between the two and quite frankly I thought this had been dead and buried long ago. Starting at the very beginning I would not entertain anything with square flanges. It might be all right for a raised track but they should never bus used on a ground level track.

Dennis Monk used to bring a party piece with him to Gilling and it consisted of a pair of wagon axles with wheels on, one had square flanges and the other set had all the correct profiles. He asked us the gather round where there was quite a long dip in the ground level track and just let the axle with the square flanges run down the hill and then it ran back but on the second trial the No 1 axle came cropper and de-railed but it had been much lazier from the start.

This happened almost every time we tried the operation. He then put the other axle on the track and just let the axle run down the hill until it could not roll any further and then it began to roll back again, gathering speed and it arrived almost back to the spot almost level with our gathered friends were standing. Without doubt it is very important to use one of these two published profiles if you want an efficient locomotive. Being one of the founder members of GL5, I of course favour the GL5 version but there is so little difference between the two it will make very little difference, so Mr. MJP the choice is yours!

The thing is that if the flanges are all square you will miss out on the differential effect of the taper on the tread of the wheel. It might A7V TANK Dear Neil, I opened MEW No. 4763 a couple of weeks ago and there in Smoke Rings was mention of a World War 1 German A7v tank. That set off a lightning flash of 'that seems familiar to me, I know something about that, I think it is here in Australia'. A little bit of Google refreshed my memory.

During a push back of German troops

by Australian troops at Villers-Bretonneux in April 1918 The German A7v tank named Mephisto - by the Germans - came into Australian possession and was eventually shipped to Brisbane where it is on display. There is a replica A7v named Wotan in Munster, Germany, that was built in 1988 based on Mephisto.

Tony Reeve, Tasmania

work fine on a raised track but it certainly will not work on a ground level railway. The point of the cone is that when entering a curve the wheel flange will push against the outer rail which means that it is running on its maximum diameter. The cone on the wheel means that it will find its own centre on a straight level track thus preventing 'hunting' and is therefore likely to de-rail.

Another problem with 'square' flanges is that if there is no 60° chamfer on the inner edge of the wheel it will mean that it is likely to take a shave off the swich blade if it is Aluminium.

The other thing about the track at Gilling

is the track geometry as this is all to do with wheel profiles and is very important.

For a start, the main line at Gilling East was all laid with transition curves and calculated superelevation, was designed

by John Heslop and friends and was built for running at 7mph. It is very impressive to see the passenger trains with ten Mark 1 coaches (weighing 28 kg each) leaning into the curves and running at a scale ninety MPH and at that speed one cannot feel the superelevation. The whole line at Gilling was built to main line standards even though the 'Six foot' was widened.

Doug Hewson, North Yorkshire

QCAD Dear Neil, in response to the letter from Mike Collins in the July Postbag re CAD software, I would like to suggest that he has a look at QCAD from RibbonSoft GmbH. I find this relatively easy to use and it can be tried free

with some limitations. If you like it, a full Professional version with a never expiring licence can be purchased at a relatively small cost, and there is a book/manual also available from Lulu.com.

Keith Keen, by email

information and will have to completely revise my own drawings (see the Alibre Atom3D screenshot). Tony also mentioned

some issues with our new design, which I hope we have largely addressed since issue 4763 – Neil.

I’d like to thank multiple readers who contacted me about the Ayv and Mephisto in particular. I now have much new

August 2025 | 15

Readers' Tips We have £30 in gift vouchers courtesy of engineering suppliers Chester Machine Tools for each month's 'Top Tip'. Email your workshop tips to meweditor@mortons.co.uk marking them 'Readers Tips', and you could be a winner. Try to keep your tip to no more than 400 words and a picture or drawing. Don’t forget to include your address! Every month we'll choose a winner for the Tip of the Month and they will win £30 in gift vouchers from Chester Machine Tools. Visit www.chesterhobbystore.com to plan how to spend yours!

A Parting Tool Holder This tip to improve a special parting toolholder is from Mike Worth: If like me, you have a mini-lathe with a QCTP you may find that parting is painful. Even with a nice, slim parting blade, the tool pressure applied at a point way off the side of the tool-post is often too much: everything tips off to the left, leading to chatter or even binding and breaking the blade.

This problem can be fixed by bringing the load more in line with the supporting saddle arrangement.

I've seen a substantial reduction in parting problems since making up a specific 'parting-blade-holder-holder'. Each time I need to part

off, I unscrew the top handle entirely, lift the whole QCTP assembly off and drop on the holder-holder. This consists of a bottom disc, which sets the tool height, and a top block that holds the parting blade holder. I made it by facing to length, roughing out the slot with an angle grinder, then finishing up with my little Adept No. 2 shaper. Alternatively you could easily make one on a mill, or even with a file if you've got more time than tools!

Note that the photos also show my compound slide replaced by another solid block of steel. This is independent of the holder-holder trick and improves rigidity for general turning. When I occasionally need to turn a taper etc. I simply swap the compound back in. The block is the same height as the compound, so tool settings etc. are unaffected.

Please note that the first prize of Chester Vouchers is only available to UK readers. You can make multiple entries, but we reserve the right not to award repeat prizes to the same person in order to encourage new entrants. All prizes are at the discretion of the Editor.

16 | www.model-engineer.co.uk

MODEL ENGINEER & WORKSHOP

BR Mogul Photo 150: Mike Jack’s cylinder casting for his Standard Class 3 2-6-2 tank.

Doug Hewson makes a start on the cylinders of his BR Standard Class 4. 155 of these locomotives, known as Moguls, were built for British Railways.

Continued from Model Engineer & Workshop issue 4766

I

had a false start because I made an error; I was told by some well-meaning person that the valve gear and cylinders of a BR Standard Class 4 were the same as my 4MT but sadly, I now realise, they are not. They are, in fact, the same as the Standard 3MT, 77000 Class and the 2-6-2 Class 3 tank loco which, fortunately, Mike Jack in New Zealand is well on with building. He has already had the cylinders cast but they are exquisite lost wax casings. I have had to spend a lot of time redrawing the cylinders, figs 64 and 65. However, the description will be just the same, fortunately. Mike is going to supply them to The Steam Workshop so many thanks to him for that. Although the photos of machining the cylinders are for my 4MT, the instructions are more or less the same for both types of cylinder.

Now, I was told by numerous people that it would be impossible to cast cylinder blocks with the back plate on so I had a word with the foundry and they sent a chap out to my shop to talk to me. In one word he answered me; his reply was, “Nonsense!” I then asked him to enlighten me and we had a most interesting conversation about cores and core prints, about

which I did not have a clue at that time. I then had another conversation with one of my early 4MT builders and he told me about a recently retired pattern maker who lived in Shrewsbury. He was an Ex-Rolls Royce man

and he made most of the patterns for the Sentinel Steam Waggons, no less! As we were going to North Wales on holiday, we made arrangements to call and see Jack and his wife, Megan and I showed him the

Photo 151: Another view; these cylinders are the same as on our Standard Class 4 Mogul.

August 2025 | 17

Fig: 64

Photo 152: A view of the back plate, an integral part of the casting.

Photo 153: Opening the bore by 1/32”.

18 | www.model-engineer.co.uk

drawings which are illustrated here. He said that the patterns would be ready in about three weeks’ time, which I thought was quite amazing. Since finding out the error of my ways, however, I have acquired a new photo of Mike’s cylinder casting, photo 150. There are also two more views; the second one is face on, photo 151 and the third one shows that back plate of the block, photo 152.

The next photos were all supplied by Geoff Whittaker who built 75069 which he has now sold on.

Geoff made a start on boring the cylinders and the first thing he did was to fit a brass bung in the bore with the centrelines marked on it. Thus marked, he could then use them to set up a boring bar and measure everything from those centrelines. In photo 153 you will see the bore being opened up by 1/32” which is so that the cylinders can be re-bored if necessary - very unusual for a 5” gauge engine but that is how the full size engines were built. This means that the end covers do not need any altering if/when the cylinders are re-bored. (More on this next time.)

In photo 154 you can see a plate being squared up to locate on an angle plate and photo 155 shows why the cylinder casting needed to be vertical to allow Geoff to use his boring bar in a facing head on the milling machine to face the outer flanges of the cylinders.

We now come to machining the back plate and Geoff has a photo in his collection, photo 156, showing a slab milling cutter in use with the surface set dead square for machining the back plate. Photograph 157 is similar but taken from different angle. Note how the casting is clamped with bars inside MODEL ENGINEER & WORKSHOP

BR Mogul

Fig: 65

Photo 156: A slab milling cutter faces the back plate.

Photo 154: Squaring up a plate.

Photo 155: Facing a cylinder flange vertically. You can see an exhaust port emerging.

Photo 157: Another view of the operation.

Photo 158: Taking a skim off the back plate edge.

August 2025 | 19

Photo 159: Another view of this operation showing the set-up.

Photo 160: Machining the steam inlet.

Photo 161: Tapping for the cylinder covers.

Photo 162: Tapping the drain cock holes.

the two bores. Now we have got to that stage, and the bores are square to the back plate, the next job was to use an angle plate - again with the back of the cylinder casting clamped to the angle plate with a couple of G-clamps and the bores set square - to take a skim off the bottom of the back plate. This is shown in photo 158 and, once again, photo 159 shows a different view of the plate clamped in place.

We now come to machining the steam inlet pipe and the seating for the anti-vacuum valve. A special mounting was made for boring the steam inlet. After Eddy G. commissioned my 4MT, however, he said that the pipes from the superheaters to the cylinder blocks could do with being larger so I have shown them with half inch pipes so beware! He took my 80080 out for a run one day and noticed that he steam chest pressure gauge was only reading about half what the boiler pressure gauge was showing and the engine was a bit sluggish.

Other builders of my 4MT and other locomotives I have designed need to take note of this. Anyway, photo 160 shows Geoff’s set-up for machining this steam inlet. Photograph 161 shows Geoff tapping the holes for the cylinder covers using the drilling table to get the holes dead square. He also used a similar set-up for tapping the drain cock holes and photo 162 shows this.

Look out for your next issue of

Model Engineer & Workshop On sale

August 15

2025

John Cuckson modifies a fixed steady to fit a Colchester Chipmaster.

Number 4768 September 2025

Gerard Dean brought a (model) Tiger Tank from the other side of the world for an exhibition.

Rod Jenkins tells the tale of his Sharp Mk. II Milling Machine.

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